Beliefnet News

Baptists’ Large Military Presence Colors Gay Debate

(RNS) In many religious circles, the repeal of a military ban on openly gay members is considered practically a done deal. But Southern Baptists, who have many more active-duty military chaplains than any other denomination, are not giving up without a fight.
The Southern Baptist Convention is battling the expected repeal of Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell on a number of fronts: its agencies are contacting Congress and the Pentagon, retired chaplains are sending letters to President Obama, and a resolution likely to be adopted at the denomination’s annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., this week (June 15-16), condemns allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military.
“If a policy makes it more difficult — in fact, discourages — one of the groups that provides one of the largest numbers of chaplains to the military from continuing to engage in chaplaincy ministry, that should raise significant concerns for them about the … spiritual well-being of our men and women in uniform,” said Barrett Duke, vice president of the denomination’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.
With about 16 million members, the Southern Baptist Convention is the country’s largest Protestant denomination, but falls well short of the Catholic Church’s 68 million members.
But whereas the Catholic Church has 252 active-duty chaplains, the Southern Baptist Convention has 448 — the most in the military. There are about 3,000 active-duty chaplains overall.
The number of active-duty personnel who say they are Southern Baptist is far smaller than the number of Roman Catholics, but there is no quota system for chaplains. Chaplains serve members of all faiths, rather than solely troops of their denomination.
More liberal denominations with much smaller numbers of military chaplains worry that Southern Baptists might be more influential in the gay debate.
“We have some concerns about that, sure,” said the Rev. John Gundlach, a retired Navy chaplain who serves as minister for government chaplaincy for the United Church of Christ, which had 17 military chaplains as of March, according to the Defense Department.
Gundlach’s denomination joined other groups like the Episcopal Church, the Unitarian Universalists and the Alliance of Baptists, in writing to Congress earlier this spring saying “this policy of government-sanctioned discrimination is morally wrong.”
Southern Baptist leaders have warned their chaplains may have to leave the military if Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell is repealed. Even their allies aren’t willing to go that far.
Archbishop Timothy Broglio, leader of the Archdiocese for the Military Services USA, has urged Congress not to repeal the current policy. But John Schlageter, general counsel for the archdiocese, said there are no plans to remove Catholic chaplains if the repeal occurs.
“We don’t think that the free exercise would be that restricted that we have to pull out,” he said, referring to the constitutional principle of freely exercising religious freedom.
The House of Representatives voted in late May for the repeal and the Senate could consider it later this month. If both houses of Congress pass the repeal, it would not go into effect until a Defense Department review is completed by Dec. 1 and President Obama and top military officials determine it won’t harm military readiness or retention.
Defense Department spokeswoman Cynthia Smith said the review panel’s mission “is not to engage in a debate about whether to repeal the law”
but rather to learn how it might affect service members and their families.
Asked if a large group like the Southern Baptists might have more influence than others, Smith said: “Our review is going to be thorough and very objective.”
Southern Baptists, who say their presence in the military chaplaincy totals 1,300 chaplains when Reserve and National Guard units are included, have told Congress and the Pentagon that chaplains could lose their freedom to preach and counsel against homosexuality if openly gay members are accepted by the military.
“For instance, a chaplain could be told there are certain passages of the Scripture that you shouldn’t preach from,” said the Rev. David Mullis, the Southern Baptists’ military chaplaincy coordinator. “If there was a prohibition about certain kinds of literature that did not espouse homosexuality, I can see the Bible being banned in the military.”
Neither military officials nor Baptists could pinpoint why the Southern Baptist Convention has far more chaplains than other denominations. But retired Army Chaplain Herman Keizer, who once served as the European Command chaplain, said the number of Southern Baptist chaplains has increased with the shortage of Roman Catholic priests in the military and reduced participation by mainline Protestants after the Vietnam War.
Also, he said, some seminaries have attracted second-career students who are too old for the chaplaincy whereas Southern Baptist and other evangelical seminaries continue to draw younger clergy candidates.
Keizer, who has endorsed chaplains for the Christian Reformed Church, said he doesn’t think Bibles will be removed from military chapels and he doubts most Southern Baptists would leave if the repeal is put in place.By ADELLE M. BANKS
Copyright 2010 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.

Since chaplains are supposed to be available to all service members, perhaps if the Southern Baptist ones can’t handle those who are gay or lesbian, then LEAVE the service. The military is no place for a chaplain to be if in time of crisis/war/ wounded/dying service he/she wouldn’t be able to console/help a homosexual service member. Leave and go to a church where they can preach how “sinful” it is to be a homosexual. Guess it doesn’t count to those Baptist preachers that those “gay” members of the military joined, were no drafted, the service and are willing to die for this country.

nnmns

So they are saying 448 guys’ prejudices should affect the ability of thousands of men and women to serve their nation. A nation that needs their service.
I think the bigots are really afraid great numbers of young men will serve alongside known homosexuals and realize they are just people too, and that their preachers have been misleading them. Something like how letting blacks serve alongside whites helped whites see blacks are just people too.

cknuck

actually nnmns its nothing like letting blacks serve alongside whites. I wish I had the time to explain to you why bur I’m a little busy.

Mordred08

I’m sure the military in, say, Iran wouldn’t mind these chaplains preaching about the evils of homosexuality. That and the evils of women getting an education and a job.

Gwyddion9

If southern baptists can’t handle the situation, then they should leave and take their religious bigotry elsewhere…like back to their churches where they continue to teach this stuff.
The first thing that comes to mind with I think of southern Baptists is Pharisees.

cknuck

Good for them they should exercise their legal rights. The censoring of the bible is a real concern

Heretic_for_Christ

The problem, ultimately, is that the military is a governmental function, and therefore shouldn’t have a formal religious dimension at all. Ideally, military personnel who are religious would go to whatever church, temple, or mosque they wish, just like civilians. Realistically, there WILL be a chaplain’s corps, and I generally respect the work they do. But these kinds of conflicts are inevitable, because a member of the clergy, with or without military rank, is also a member of a faith that adheres to a certain set of doctrines. So there WILL be times when chaplains are caught between the dictates of their religions and the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

cmaglaughlin

This is to Christians EVERYWHERE! The slippery slope is now a landslide. Our faith does not include “cookie cutting.” Preaching the WHOLE counsel of God might get you in hot water with “man.” But NOT preaching it will place you outside of His Holy protection. Choose this day whom thou shalt serve.

Heretic_for_Christ

cmaglaughlin,
What you are describing is NOT preaching the “counsel of God.” It is preaching a human-devised sectarian doctrine based on a particularly narrow interpretation of an ancient set of human writings in which people of ages past tried to express their own notions about God. Those writings have become fossilized and turned into an object of idolatrous worship by bibliolators whose primary faith is not in God but in a book.
You have every right to urge people to follow a human-devised doctrine purportedly based on that human-authored book–but in referring to a doctrine and a book as the “counsel of God,” you are promoting bibliolatry. You may recall that God as described in the Hebrew scriptures took an exceptionally dim view of all forms of idolatry–so those who consider that depiction of God to be accurate should be especially wary of promoting bibliolatry.

nnmns

Breaking news: Jesus was struck by lightning and burned to the groun. This is the famous “Touchdown Jesus” by the “Solid Rock” church off I-75 in Monroe, Ohio. Apparently the Jesus statue, at least, was not in fact solid rock.
You can find the movie by Googling “touchdown jesus video”.

cmaglaughlin

@hereticforChrist…can’t you read? This was to CHRISTIANS. Butt out! Keep your pathetic, immoral, distasteful, sinful, unbelieving, anti-Christian and anti-intellectual poppycock to yourself and your inbred ilk. What are you gonna say, and whom will you call upon, when you are on your death bed, gasping for air, as the flames of hell nip at your feet, waiting upon the tolling of your putrifying and wasted life to run its course, so they can put a tag on your toe and haul you away to your just reward? You’ll cry for sure. Good riddance. God calls you a fool. Choose this day whom THOU shalt serve.

nnmns

Wow, cmag, you’ve let yourself get really upset at your inability to answer H4C’s points.
As for this being for CHRISTIANS, no it’s about our army and so it’s for all Americans, many of whom are not Christians. Happily.
You know you don’t have to believe in Hell or any of that, and if you don’t, you can cast off those nagging doubts about which way you will go. And I’m guessing if you could achieve that it would be good for your frame of mind.
What do you think it means that Jesus was struck by lightning and burned to the ground?

Heretic_for_Christ

cmalaughlin,
Yes, I can read. You called on Christians to join you in your bibliolatry. You called on them to abandon the teachings of Jesus in favor of your blasphemous ideology. And your very language, full of metaphors of filth and decay, are eloquent indicators of where your mind and heart and spirit are.

cmaglaughlin

@hereticforChrist-You’re an idiot. You can’t separate the words of Jesus from his teachings. His teachings are far less important than who He said He was. He said in John 17,”I pray not for the world.” Somebody needed to shake you from your hell bound pathway. Jesus is and was the Word, that became flesh. Have you received Him as your very own savior? If not, pay for your own sin, and try to save yourself from fire and feeding maggots. “Except you humble yourself and become as a child, you shall never perceive the Kingdom of God.” He is either a liar, lunatic, legend or the Truth. Choose one.

pagansister

Excellent Post, H4C…well stated….and I totally agree with what your wrote.
And guess what, cmag, what you “proclaim” is true for you and some others, but not for everyone. In the military, the chaplains need to be available to soldiers of all faiths, not just their particular one. So calm down….nothing here to get that upset about. Your ranting really wouldn’t convince me or scare me into any faith, in fact it is a total turn off. As to the death bed of those who don’t believe as you do…why worry, IMO there is no such thing as a Hell (except in the minds of some) or heaven for that matter. When I die…that’s it…my energy will return to where it came from…so no problem. Flames licking feet? You’ve got to be kidding!

pagansister

cmag, I know the post written at 2:18 today is for H4C, but calling folks an idiot really only makes you sound like a child who can’t think of what to say to someone who happens to disagree with you. You’re certainly “zealous” (to put it mildly) in your words/beliefs. The bible is just a book written to push an agenda…that of what JC was supposed to have done and said. Written so long after he died that even it’s original publishing was probably inaccurate…and certainly after 2000 plus years of editing/translating and changing…accuracy is out the window. Why take total advice from that? Great stories (just that, stories) pretty poetry in some sections, sex, adventures, theft, incest etc. It can be a great read…follow for my life guide…nope. My first 17 years I was taught stuff from there, read it,..then decided…no, not for me. That was a very long time ago. Haven’t changed my mind. For those that it works for, fine, but don’t expect everyone to be impressed with it, or personally condemn those who don’t happen to find it a necessary part of their lives. And as I said above…no one would be likely to take you seriously with the way you “spread” THE WORD. Trying to scare folks into belief won’t encourage anyone to be a believer.

Tom

Personally, I’d be against any repeal if it restricts any preachings on the morality of such a divisive issue. After all, I’m sure there are many “bigots” who have/do serve and die for our great country. If they feel the need to be ministered to by chaplains who share their beliefs, then hey; no big whoop. After all, it’s a big world. Who are we to judge them for choosing a different life path than our own? The same-sexers can maintain their “progressive” chaplains while allowing different-minded chaplains to minister to their flocks. Problem solved. TOLERANCE. What a beautiful concept.

cmaglaughlin-
I am a lifelong Christian and I agree completely with H4C post regarding idolatry. There is no record of our Lord ever saying anything against gays/lesbians.
Your support of bigotry, inequality, prejudice, and discrimination seems to be in contradiction to the teachings of our Lord.
How profoundly sad that some attempt to use Christianity to justify bigotry, inequality, prejudice, and discrimination!
Peace!

cknuck

JohnQ find a record of Jesus speaking for homosexuality and against the belief that homosexuality is a sin and then maybe you would have something but to sake your claim on “He didn’t say not too” is well you know what it is.

cknuck

YK there is nothing wrong with the truth, no is a Christian word that we need to use more often these days. The bible certainly says no to homosexuality.

cknuck

H4C there always since the very conception of our military there has been a formal religion dimension why would you try to spread such a lie. or are you saying it shouldn’t be because you say it shouldn’t? How so very much you think of yourself, well you are too late historically there always have been military religious from George Washington to now.

nnmns

cknuck you’re apparently having trouble reading again. H4C said “The problem, ultimately, is that the military is a governmental function, and therefore shouldn’t have a formal religious dimension at all.” He was clearly giving his opinion. How can you call his expression of his own opinion a lie?
Did you make that silly claim because you didn’t understand what he said in his 6:02 am post, or is it just your ongoing hatred of homosexuality and rights for homosexuals that led you to this false claim?

cmaglaughlin

@JohnQ…If you are a “Christian,” you were NEVER a “life long” Christian. Everyone except Christ was born with a sin nature, because of “the fall.” Therefore, everyone “must be born-again.” A Divine Imperative. When exactly were you born-again? I know the time and place. If you don’t, you NEVER were. If you had the Spirit to lead and guide you into ALL truth, you’d know that Jesus DID speak concerning homosexuality. Matthew 17:29-spoke of the destruction of Sodom from heaven.(reason:men lying with men, lusting after the angels(men) from heaven.” Paul, His personally chosen chief apostle to reach the Gentiles, said in Romans 2:24-32, paraphrase, God gave men up to their vile unnatural affections for one another, “worthy of death.” I Corinthians 6:9-“the effeminate will not inherit the Kingdom of God.” Since Christ was God incarnate, what Paul wrote was predestined to be written in Holy Writ. Matthew 19:4-6-Man was created male and female. The two become one. Not male and male, or female and female. Matthew 24:35-“Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my word shall never pass away.” Rev:22:18-19-“paraphrase…Don’t mess with the Book!” The day they remove the Bible from the military is the day America will be utterly destroyed.

JohnQ

cmaglaughlin-
I would think you would know that our Lord Jesus Christ died for our sins. My sins were washed away with his death upon the cross and his Resurrection.
Peace!

Heretic_for_Christ

JohnQ,
Thank you for understanding and supporting my comment about idolatry.
cknuck,
I stated clearly that I respect the work done by most military chaplains. But there are problems, as we see here. Apart from the establishment clause, there is a potential for some over-zealous chaplain to try to turn American military personnel into Soldiers for God. (General Boykin, though not a chaplain himself, illustrates the danger of military officers forgetting that the military serves the United States of America, not God, and certainly not some sectarian notion of what God wants.) When I was in the Army, there were people of various faiths and some with no faith; what united us was that we all served (in the words of the Code of Conduct) “our country and our way of life.”

cknuck

JohnQ “but should we continue to sin” “NO!” Unless you don’t believe he will come to judge, or that He will say “depart from Me” I know in order to practice certain sins one has to disregard some biblical principles.
H4 “our way of life” is freedom of religion not from it. Most of the founders would have trouble with your viewpoints including George Washington our very first commander and chief, literally.

nnmns

cknuck I think H4C’s got a good deal more accurate idea of history than you do. Yours sounds like it’s come from some wishful sources.

Heretic_for_Christ

On the matter of “freedom OF religion” versus “freedom FROM religion”:
1. Neither of these phrases actually appears in the Constitution. What the first amendment says, precisely, is: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
2. Some have argued that this means that there can be no officially recognized state religion. In fact, it means far more than that; according to usconstitution.net, “Whereas in Europe, the ‘establishment of religion’ did mean a state church, it took on a whole new meaning in America. Several attempts were made in several states to have and maintain official churches, but the multitude of denominations made it increasingly difficult to do so…Clearly, the trend in church/state relations was towards no relationship at all.
In the end, the 1st Amendment not only prevents the establishment of a national religion, but it also prohibits government aid to any religion, even on an non-preferential basis, as well as protecting the right of the individual to choose to worship, or not, as he or she sees fit.”
3. So the problem is that any official governmental recognition of the existence of God or of the validity of religion (not just the validity of a specific religion, but of religious beliefs in general) is that it means government has officially declared God–and, let us be frank here, the Abrahamic God specifically–to be real. Government is not qualified to make any such declaration. And then what about those who do not believe in God at all or who believe in various gods that are self-evidently different from “God” or “Creator” as construed at the time of our nation’s birth? If they deny what the government declares to be Official Truth, they could be considered second-class citizens if not disloyal enemies of the state.
4. In order to protect freedom of religion, the only fair stance of government is maintain what Thomas Jefferson called a wall of separation between church and state. If the government were to avoid all mention of faith and God, it would NOT be an infringement of freedom of religion; quite the contrary, it is exactly when government makes some official pronouncement that states or implies that God exists–and wink, wink, we all know which God that is–that freedom of religion is compromised.
5. Christians (who seem to be the only religion in America that wants government to officially recognize the existence of God (for example, insisting that 10 commandments plaques appear in courthouses and other governmental venues) are sometimes self-contradictory on this topic: As conservatives, they have some distrust of government, yet they want government to recognize religion (in general, or Christianity in particular) as valid. They claim that atheism is a religion, yet they see no infringement of atheists’ freedom of religion if government recognizes the existence of God. Conversely, they do see infringement of their own freedom of religion if government does NOT recognize the existence of God.
6. Much needless bickering could be avoided if we all recognized one simple truth: absolute insulation between government and religion is NOT an attempt to destroy religion or to deny the place of religion in American history; it is merely an attempt to take the Constitution seriously.

nnmns

I was agreeing and supplementing H4C’s statement but again my comment was held for the blog owner. This time there was no HTML at all.
Are others here experiencing this?

Heretic_for_Christ

nnmns,
I look forward to seeing what additional perspectives you bring to this topic.
Over the past month or so, I have had 3 experiences of comments being held up; in one case, I thought maybe I had used a term that was on a list of proscribed words, and that triggered an automatic flagging system; but on the other occasions there was no such possible concern about vocabulary.

pagansister

nnmns, so far I’ve had no comments pulled “for review” in a long time, (watch this one will be pulled!), but I have found the time to get from one article to another has started taking longer with the addition of Facebook and whatever “like”is….on B’net. I click to get out of an article and watch lines of numbers and letters flash on the lower line of my screen. After it finally does it’s thing, I get back to this the News site or to the other blogs. Sometimes it’s very SLOW moving between things. Don’t know if it is my PC or traffic caused by Facebook and Like.

cknuck

Actually H4C that may be the position that has been made popular recently by anti-religious zealots much like yourself and nnmns but the framers demonstrated a much different interpretation of their “own” words. they prayed to our Lord and Savior Christ for hours in all of their decisions, in congress and in the House of Representative they held church quite often including Thomas Jefferson. Christians have made up the majority of all political offices from president down so yes they do have an interest in that this time honored trend be not forgotten because in their belief as often quoted it was a combination of prayer reverence of god and good people that has raised this country to the level of success we have enjoyed in the past. Many believe that it is the lack of these things that is taking us into the depths that we are plunging currently and in the near future.

Heretic_for_Christ

Well, cknuck, we’ve had this discussion over and over. Your notions of history do not agree with mine. But I will repeat the question I have asked before: IF faith in Jesus were that foremost in the minds of the founding fathers, why does the Constitution say not one word about God, Jesus, faith, churches, salvation, or the Bible? Why is that the 2 places where “religion” is mentioned both take the position of forbidding any establishment of religion or any religious requirement to hold public office? If they were such passionate born-again Christians, they certainly crafted an amazingly secularist document in the Constitution, wouldn’t you say?

nnmns

Clearly it’s George Bush, the Republican Party, talk radio and their benefactor Greed that are taking us into those depths.

cknuck

“SECTION I. Well aware that
the opinions and belief of men depend not on their own will, but follow involuntarily the evidence proposed to their minds;
that Almighty God hath created the mind free, and manifested his supreme will that free it shall remain by making it altogether insusceptible of restraint;”
The bill is a protection actually from people like you and what has happened to American concerning religion. When the constitution was written their was but one religion driving it and no one fighting it. Now there are s many religious demands including no religion. So the language was designed that big government would not make demands on religious freedoms even to the point of excluding it.

Heretic_for_Christ

The Virginia Act on Religious Freedom is not the Constitution. And notwithstanding the pious language about Almighty God, the terms “Jesus” and “Christ” do not appear in it. And what it says is that no one will be forced to engage in any kind of religious activity.
That would be my position, too–so how do you conclude that the Act PROTECTS people from the “threat” posed by those who agree that no one should be compelled to participate in religion?

cknuck

It has nothing to do with compelling anyone, that is so over the top H, and people like you would love to spread such mis-information. a person should be able to stand anywhere and profess their faith on any level, that’s what the founders did and that’s what they wanted us to be able to do.

Heretic_for_Christ

cknuck,
Go for it! Who’s trying to stop you? On my daily commute to work, I routine pass an elderly gentlemen with a bull-horn who shouts “The day of the lord is coming! Listen to the cry of the warrior!” No one stops him (he says it once and then goes on his way). Shout your faith if you want to… But do it on your own, and don’t try to get governmental endorsement for it, because that is absolutely NOT what the founding fathers wanted.

cknuck

H then why did they print the bible and use it for schools? Why were there bibles everywhere they went and in every building they did business in?

Heretic_for_Christ

cknuck,
Notwithstanding the claims of David Barton, the Tea Party darling and revisionist “historian” (who has no academic qualifications in history), the founding fathers did NOT print the Bible for use in schools. I assume you are referring to the Bible printed in 1782 by Robert Aitken. Aitken asked the Continental Congress for approval to print a Bible because imports were scarce given the circumstances of the Revolutionary War. The Congress asked its chaplains to examine Aitken’s edition for accuracy, and the chaplains reported that it was a good edition with few printing errors, so Aitken was granted approval for printing and distribution in the schools. It is a distortion to say that the founding fathers took it upon themselves to print a Bible and distribute it to the schools. Rather, they considered a request that had been made and granted approval.
Now clearly, this demonstrates that the members of the Continental Congress were not atheists and did not want to abolish religion–no one has EVER made such a claim. But neither were they evangelicals who intended for America to be a BIble-based Christian nation (well, some of them may have been, but clearly they were the small minority, which is absolutely demonstrated by the simple fact that the Constitution is entirely secular in its language and content). They were, for the most part, deist in their beliefs
If your main source of historical information is Christian websites, you will continue to perpetuate myths. The founding fathers were educated men steeped in the ideas of the Age of Reason; the last thing they would have wanted for the new nation is anything that smelled like theocracy. Is that truth really so dreadful and threatening?

cknuck

The founders often quoted scripture and made evangelical statements about God Washington for one often made statements that could be considered evangelical. Ben Franklin read a book from bible on one of his political trips to France. I would hope that all ages are the ages of reasoning but if you are eluding a form of atheism or some sort of new age religion, I would certainly challenge that notion. Although Franklin and Jefferson could be considered this type of thinker they certainly were in the minority. Most were devote Christians many even pastor-ed churches, as a matter of fact the church played a intricate role in winning the war and forming the government.

Your Name

Not sure what the Founding Fathers (or if they did or did not print a Bible for use in schools) has to do with the undue influence of the Baptists over the ability of gay American soldiers to serve their country openly.
Trust cknuck to derail the debate with irrelevant opinionos and mis-information.

Jewel

For info on the dark unseen forces behind and related to the upcoming Fayetteville, Arkansas gay parade (featuring a brainwashed 10-year-old boy!), Google “Obama Supports Public Depravity,” “Separation of Raunch and State” and “Government-Approved Illegals.” Did Arkansas learn anything from its recent flood-related disaster? Which being has the final say about what goes on on His planet? Try guessing!
[Ran into the above web bit.]

Grumpy Old Person

Yes, Jewel, the ‘right’ seem to believe the very existance of gay people is “public depravity”. They have dirty minds, I think.

http://www.zazzle.com/cinnamon_shiva?rf=238192580288868513 Caspian

What I find so incredibly tragic in this matter of the Southern Baptists proudly proclaiming their Military Chaplains won’t give up without a fight, is that their platform for upholding sex discrimination policy in the military is an example of the Anti-Christ!
Not of Christ. Jesus never preached against gays. In fact he admonished we love our neighbor as ourselves. If our neighbor is gay is that commandment void?! Of course not.
If Southern Baptists and all Christ believers first accept that God is Omni-Genetic, i.e. the creator of all that is, was or shall be, then they must acknowledge through that belief/faith, that God created Gays.
To then say Gays are worthy of hate, intolerance, discrimination and abuse, because lawful discrimination and prohibition of their right to be free and equal in this free country is abuse of their Citizen status, is to say that in that believers mortal opinion Omni-Genetic God created a mistake when he created Gays. That the Omniscient Omnipresent creator erred in the creation of those particular humans made in his image and likeness. And as such in that believers opinion it is their faithful duty to pervert Jesus’ commandment and therefore love only the straight neighbor.
In which case, after all is said and done and the life is lived and over I would like to be there at the throne of heaven so that when that discriminating believer stands before God and accounts of their life they reap the judgment as their life proclaimed that they were proud bigots while on Earth. Because in their finite sinful mortal opinion when God made Gays he made a mistake and thus it was up to that Believer to prove it! By fighting the repeal of, “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” and loving only their straight neighbors, as they lived the example of not Christ like but kinda sorta.
Of course, I’d like to be standing at a distance to watch this. Because when the floor of heaven opens and that bigot anti-Christ falls through to hell, I don’t want to be close to the edge of darkness.
What is also extraordinary about this repulsive discrimination in the Military is that while gays fight and die for the same cause as straights, their suppose to serve mute and ashamed of their person-hood. They’re suppose to fight and die for a country that proclaims itself to be free and equal…for everyone but gays! And what this policy proves more than anything else, is that straights are afraid to be in foxholes with gays. That it is then their sexuality that is insecure, because if they know that soldier beside them is gay it may effect their morale as a professionally trained killer in uniform.
But if they’re ignorant of the sex life of the soldiers they serve with, they can handle their duties unaffected!
It will be a great day when gays are free to be equal in America and her Military. It will be a greater day when gay citizens have more rights than do the illegal aliens that are currently allowed to enlist and serve! When illegal alien criminals have more rights than gay citizen soldiers in the military, we’ve got a problem that extends well past the uniform and well past concern for who screws who in private.
God forgive us. And God forgive the Anti-Christ Southern Baptist Chaplains that do the Devil’s work in this cause!

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